The Bangladesh RMG industry maintains a strong supply chain link with global fashion buyers. Consequently, the emergence and closure of new factories, along with the addition of new buyers in the supply chain, are common occurrences. However, recent years have seen a growing concern over factory closures, with approximately 300 factories reported as closed in 2023, according to various media sources.

Mapped in Bangladesh (MiB) since 2017, has been publishing 3700+ export-oriented RMG factories’ data on a digital map to enable transparency and accountability of the industry by providing stakeholders access to open and live data.

In 2023, for its Phase 2, MiB conducted two surveys March to October for collecting and updating Cluster 5 (different RMG-producing districts all over the country) and Cluster 1 (Dhaka District), and found that RMG factories that were mapped in Phase 1 (last updated as of 2021) are currently not operational in designated locations. MiB has termed these factories as non-operational factories, instead of “closed factories” as the word “closed” itself could have different meanings.

During the survey, when any factory is found to be non-operational by contacting a person responsible for factory management, the FOs report it as non-operational to the Field Supervisor. Then the Field Supervisor verifies the operational status of the given factory during the survey through a visit. After that, the Field Coordinator is notified and the factories which are reported to be non-operational are randomly visited.

Additionally, the monitoring team also visits the reportedly non-operational factories in a random order for the quality check of data. After three months of data collection, the Data Verification and Validation (DVV) team verifies the operational status through a phone call. If the factory contact cannot be reached, then the status “non-operational” remains the same. If the factory is found operational according to the phone call with the factory contact, then an FO is sent to collect/update data from the factory. If the factory is a member of BGMEA and BKMEA, MiB also checks the operational status of those factories with the current member list provided by BGMEA and BKMEA.

Factories can be non-operational for various reasons, such as relocation, temporary closure with uncertain reopening dates, or permanent closure, particularly among smaller factories not affiliated with trade bodies like BGMEA or BKMEA.

Although many reasons have been heard for factory closures, research on the issue has been limited. As a live map, MiB removes non-operational factories, effectively dropping them from the map. The list of non-operational factories, along with their contact information from the survey, is available for future reference and research purposes. This database has been linked for future reference and research purposes. The database can further be used for highlighting the situation of these non-operational factories as it has the factory contact information when factories were surveyed.

A detailed Research Brief on the non-operational factories will be published from MiB shortly.

For any queries and suggestions, please email: [email protected].

List of non-operational factories.